How to Win at Anything You Do

It feels good to win a game — and what feels better than winning, is winning with good play.

You clicked into this article — that means you’re probably as excited about winning as I am.

On top of the dopamine rush, what’s the point of winning?

The process of winning is the best way to 1) boost persistent motivation, 2) practice strategic thinking, and 3) learn from mistakes to improve.

When we strive to win in the game we’re playing — whether it’s a sport, a PC strategy game, a competition, or a challenging project — that’s when we’ll work at our best to achieve our fullest potential.

The Game Plan

In the next 3 minutes, I’ll explain to you what you can do to win almost any game in 5 steps: know your why, know the rules, know your opponents, form your strategy, and apply it flexibly.

If you find anything unclear, do let me know in the comments after reading.

Step 1: Know Your Why

You need to know you’re playing the right game first, or else winning becomes meaningless. Why is it important for you to win this game?

You’ll determine if this is the right game for you, or if you should be playing another game in the first place.

Your reason might be things like “to prove myself”, “for the psychological or financial reward”, “for the fun of it”, or “for my passion”. Whatever your reason is, as long as it can convince you, it’s a good reason.

Step 2: Understand the Rules

Now that you know you’re playing the right game, the next step is to understand the rules inside out.

Every game has a set of rules, some clearly laid out, some implied. It is up to you to not only understand the rules given to you, but also the hidden rules that may be the deciding factor later on.

Step 3: Understand Your Opponent

Next comes what’s often overlooked — the opponent. No matter what game you’re playing, you’ll always have an opponent, whether you realize it or not.

The opponent is not always human. It could be the environment, existing systems, or even yourself. We don’t identify an opponent by its title, but by the fact that you must overtake or overcome it to win.

To understand your opponent, follow these steps.

1. Know who or what your opponents are.
2. Know their characteristics — what poses the biggest threat to you.
3. Find their weaknesses — how you can overtake them.

Step 4: Formulate Your Strategy

Here’s the exciting part — you form your plan of attack.

Start with research. What did others who played your game do? What worked and what didn’t? What strategies did past winners use? Past losers?

For example, if you want to win a chess match, it might be a good idea to look at the moves and tactics world masters use.

Extract meaning from patterns. Research gives you information, but the information is meaningless before you make sense of it. So, identify patterns in good play and trace success and failure down to specific actions to understand what the game really comes down to.

Consider the impact of the 2 P’s — probability and psychology. By probability, I mean that there is always a component of random variation when we relate outputs to their inputs. By psychology, I mean to consider the irrationality behind human behavior — humans are not robots, so don’t treat them as such when forming a strategy. If used well, the 2 P’s can give us an advantage.

Break it down, and turn it into a model. Generally, a game can be seen as a relationship between a set of inputs and a set of outputs (sometimes just one). The impact of each input varies in significance, and each input and output almost always interrelate with all others to varying extents. Understanding these relationships help us prioritize our efforts and make better decisions when adjusting our inputs — to get the winning output.

I know you might be lost. Let me illustrate this with an example.

Suppose you want to win a race.

Your inputs are: how strong your leg muscles are, how much you weigh, how long your legs are, how good your shoes are, how much protein you ate for breakfast, how good you’re feeling mentally & physically, how quickly you react to the pistol firing, etc.

Your output is: how many seconds it takes for you to reach the finish line

And the inputs are related in ways like your weight probably relates to your leg length, your mental and physical state are impacted by what you ate and influence your reaction to the pistol, etc.

So that’s how to formulate your strategy. Let’s recap.

Start with research. Extract meaning from patterns. Consider the impact of the 2 P’s — probability and psychology. Break it down, and turn it into a model.

Step 5: Apply & Adapt Your Strategy

Optimize the most important inputs from Step 4 one by one. Now that you’ve broken the game down into its fundamental components, you can work on the parts you’re weakest in and that are most important to you.

For example, if you realized leg strength is the determining factor of winning a race, and your legs are quite weak, you can focus on leg exercises.

Put more effort into places that’ll generate the best results. Recognize that some inputs are easy to change, while others take significant effort. You’ll probably get the best return by investing your limited time and energy into aspects you can get the most and quickest gain.

All in all, be methodical, stay calm, enjoy the process, and just relax after you’ve given it your best. Once you’ve optimized what’s in your area of control, just sit back and enjoy the ride.

That completes the 5 steps you can take to win any game.

Quick recap:

Step 1: Know your why

Step 2: Understand the rules

Step 3: Understand your opponent

Step 4: Formulate your strategy

Step 5: Apply & adapt your strategy

A Final Word — Process or Result?

Today, those who want to win are labeled as people who “only focus on results”. They’re discounted by the overwhelming attitude of “just enjoy the process”, which seems to suggest we shouldn’t care about results at all.

But the issue here is, trying to win doesn’t conflict with enjoying the process. In fact, they complement each other!

I think the winning mentality is underrated today. I do believe that we should never put winning above our principles, but I see our trying to win within boundaries as a sign of sincerity — of not settling for less than what we’re capable of.

I hope what I shared will empower you to be the winner that you are. Next time you find yourself in a game you want to win, don’t forget to come back.

Thanks for reading, and see you soon.

If you’re interested in strategy, business, or personal development, give me a follow and check out my other articles. I’m excited to hear your thoughts and share more valuable content with you.

— Yvonne